SHANGHAI, China, June 15, 2015 / Xinhua-AsiaNet — UnionPay International and ANZ jointly announced on June 11 in Melbourne that all the ATMs and merchants under ANZ in Australia will accept UnionPay cards (card number starting with 62) and the UnionPay QuickPass service will be available in Australia for the first time.

As an innovative chip-based contactless payment service, UnionPay QuickPass allows cardholders to pay with a simple tap-and-go. Myer, Australia’s largest department store group will become the first local merchant to enable QuickPass acceptance.

“The cooperation will not only expand the UnionPay card acceptance in Australia and promote payment experience but will also see technological upgrade of UnionPay card acceptance that further improves card-using security and meets with the trend of technological innovation as well as card-using habit changes,” said Cai Jianbo, CEO of UnionPay International.

“It also sets a solid foundation for the localization of UnionPay card services and the issuance of UnionPay cards with HCE capability in Australia,” Cai said.

The UnionPay card acceptance has expanded to over 150 countries and regions with more than 26 million merchants and 1.8 million ATMs accepting UnionPay cards globally. Innovative payment services including contactless payment, online payment and mobile payment have gained momentum in the international market.

In markets including Hong Kong, Macau, South Korea and Taiwan, where UnionPay card services are relatively mature, UnionPay International is actively promoting QuickPass service and the Northeast Asia demonstration zone for innovation has taken shape.

The merchants under ANZ that will accept UnionPay cards will all enable QuickPass, the first time the service is made available in markets outside Asia.

At present, the global issuance of UnionPay chip cards has exceeded 1 billion with 700 million of them having QuickPass capability. In the Chinese mainland, there are over 5 million QuickPass terminals; In Australia, South Korea, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, tens of thousands of merchants provide QuickPass payment service.

In Taiwan and Pakistan, UnionPay International has launched the mPOS acquiring service that allows small and micro merchants including local specialty shops to accept payment with UnionPay cards in a cost-efficient and secure way.

UnionPay cross-border online payment is also expanding quickly. A total of 10 million online merchants outside the Chinese mainland have enabled payment with UnionPay cards. Besides, UnionPay International also offers the Shop The World platform to allow UnionPay cardholders to shop around the world at home.